INTRO LOG: DECEMBER

[inthenightmods]

INTRO LOG: DECEMBER
IF I HAD A HEART

characters: everyone.
location: the harbor, as well as the rest of town.
date/time: december 1-3.
content: beacon's newest batch of residents arrives on the ferry. robin posts a bulletin.
warnings: n/a.

welcome to beacon.

It's dim, and the room won't stop swaying, gently rocking you back and forth. A loud sound startles you fully awake, a deep, moaning call: a foghorn. As your eyes adjust, you note faint red light streaking through the room from a tiny, round window.

You've found yourself in a private room, lying on a bed. The last things you remember are the events that led up to your death. Beside you is a folded tablet and a lantern glowing with a healthy flame.

You're on a ship. And that ship is docking.

Making your way to the deck, and eventually the pier, you find only moonlight to greet you, and a dark forest beyond. There are other people here, each with their own unique lantern, and many of them look just as lost as you are. On the ferry you've just disembarked from, the speaker system begins to play a song.

In the distance, across the waters of the lake, you can see the tall silhouette of a lighthouse, its red light slowly turning.

•••
The ferry has barely docked when everyone's tablets will ping: A new weekly bulletin has been posted!

...Aaaaaanyway, luckily for all the newcomers, the tablet and the town have some resources available for getting acquainted with their new situation! In fact, as soon as they're prompted to enter a network username, an app containing all sorts of useful welcome information will launch. Newcomers can always check out the weekly bulletins and the records in town hall as well, and everyone's welcome to get in touch with the NPCs through their inboxes.

ooc.

Hey there, wonderful players, and welcome to In the Night! You've happened to come at a chaotic time, as we've just wrapped up a rather large event. Half the town was stuck in a dreamland version of past Beacon, where they explored for clues about the town's history. The other half stayed awake and defended the town from a brutal onslaught of green-eyed, hallucination-inducing forest spirits. The town's pretty haggard after all that, so hey, there's a conversation starter! It'll be good to have some fresh faces around to help with the recovery process.

You can check out the various Enter Mr. Sandman event posts in the OOC and log comms if you're curious, and plenty of the details will likely come up ICly, as well! The aftermath is just beginning, and we're so glad to have you along for the ride. :)

DELIVERIES

The following packages can be found in the cargo hold:

• The monthly store restock
  
• For Eliot: A carton of cigarettes
  
• For Prompto: 17 pairs of reading glasses
  
• For Eleven: A pair of walkie-talkies, and enough batteries to last for 3 months of casual use
  
• For Aziraphale: 12 drums, 11 lead pipes, 10 pairs of shoes, 9 wilting corsages, 8 bottles of milk, 7 taxidermy swans, 6 goose eggs, 5 stale onion rings, 4 bins full of duck armies, 3 dead chickens, 2 turtles, and a whole tree, though it's long dead... and strung with lights and garlands and holiday ornaments!
  
• For Kol: A book
  
• For Crowley: Peppermint extract, cream of tartar, a candy thermometer, a tin of cocoa, graham crackers, a generic bottle of red wine, a t-shirt with a crown logo on it, a book of love poems, and the goods
  
• For Eleven: An assortment of wrapping paper, gift tags, ribbons, bows, and gift bags.
  
• A lot of medical supplies. The supplies are plentiful enough that everyone may handwave finding common first aid supplies that will help to triage injuries sustained during the Enter Mr. Sandman event. The supplies won't immediately cure wounds, but they will help to prevent infection and ensure proper healing. There's even an assortment of painkillers, ranging from over the counter pills to IV morphine (though, hm, it seems each character will only be able to find one dose of the hospital-grade stuff, no matter how hard they search)

If you submitted an item request last month and we've missed it here, let us know!

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Comments

[callada]

Oh. Huh. I've heard there's an island in my world with a small race like that. We call them dwarves, though.

[Speaking of horrific childhood stories, because who doesn't love being told as a kid that his family historically enslaved those people hundreds of years ago? Nothing like wealth and prosperity built on the backs of the Tontatta. Suddenly, this Santa fellow is a lot less funny in his mind, not that he lets his smile fade.]

Don't think they make toys. I don't know much about them, to be honest.

[necromantiae]

I don't think they're real either. We do have dwarves as well but they do not make toys for good little girls and boys.

( what a poe. )

I think a man like that might have existed at one point in history but there's nothing like that now. It's a nice story to tell kids and they get excited by it but eventually, they grow out of it.

[callada]

Yeah, that's how those old myths and legends tend to start, I guess. Old man gives out toys to kids in one village and the next thing you know, he's apparently sledding all over the world with elves and deer.

[It's cute, though. He can see the appeal for children.]

You ever run into something like that where you thought it was just a story, and then it turns out it was real?

[necromantiae]

Oh, plenty of times. Most of the time, the stories are something out of a nightmare, meant to scare people and then you find out they're true and...

( he shrugs. )

And then you realize the world is a lot more worse than you originally thought.

[callada]

Sorry to hear that.

[Because he knows examples just like it, things that shouldn't be real but are, and turn out to be purely awful.]

Still, there are a lot of people here from Earth who seemed to have get by all right. Smart, talented people. I guess sometimes the dark parts of the world are good at hiding themselves.

[necromantiae]

I can agree with that. The dark parts are the world are good at convincing you they don't exist until you least expect it.

( when you're lulled into a false sense of security and your guard is down and something happens. )

Guess it's good to have a plan for those instances.

[callada]

And being here sure puts that ability to the test. We're surrounded by it - not just literal darkness.

[The constant threat of death by reset, by spirits just being spirits, by accident or somehow least likely by their fellow residents. They're lucky to have a group of people that hasn't gone the way of some of the others. Has there even been a single murder? He would have heard about it, surely.]

But I just spent weeks thinking about how we could have planned better. Not interested in rehashing it all right now. Pretty sure that's a good way to go insane.

[necromantiae]

That's...a good point. Let's not think about that now. I came here specifically not to think about that. I've been trying not to think about anything.

( it wasn't working very well which is why he's going for the booze. )

Let's not think anymore. No more business talk. We're off duty.

[callada]

That we are. I went three years without a break before I got here. Almost four, actually. It's about time I let myself have one.

[So here's a drink to that. He's bad at letting himself rest and he knows it but he really, really needs to just give in.]

[necromantiae]

Cheers to that.

( he raises his glass and then knocks it back. )

Time to not think of anything but booze for at least an hour.

[callada]

An hour of freedom, then.

[What he wouldn't do for more, but he'll take what he can get.]

Know any good two-person drinking games?

[necromantiae]

Not off the top of my head, no.

( more's the pity. )

You?

[callada]

No. Never played them much at home. Might have to invent some.

[Always an outsider back then, now he's finally starting to come around to the idea of spending time around people whose company he enjoys. Here, it's less dangerous. Getting a little drunk, saying a little too much, it won't have the same sort of weight it did there.

Still risky though. Still goes against how he's spent the last two decades.]

Oh well. We have all winter for that. If this snow gets much worse, we'll be indoors a lot more than usual.

[necromantiae]

Oh, don't say that. I spent seventy five years on a house arrest type punishment. I don't need that again.

( even if snow allowed for snuggling. that would be fun. )

[callada]

[He still can't imagine being stuck in one place for so long. It's a wonder Ambrose didn't go completely insane.

More alcohol, anyway. Time to pour a refill. He tops off Ambrose's drink while he's at it.]

Maybe it'll be fun, though. I've never seen snow so deep I couldn't open the door but I've heard that happens some places. We could dig out pathways and still get around. And then, I dunno. Make extra-tall snowmen.

[necromantiae]

( well, he'd gotten close to insane a few times so. )

Or, you can make extra tall snowmen and I'll supervise and tell you what you need to do and what spots needs your magical touch while I stay somewhere warm and drink coffee.

( he was great at delegation. )

[callada]

Just like you did with the bridge?

[Kidding, of course, as indicated by his grin. Ambrose had pulled his own weight on that trip just fine, which is why the snowman supervision is funny. The cold sucks, though, he gets it.]

Bring me a full thermos every hour while I'm building a snowman army to fend off the spirits, and we have a deal.

[necromantiae]

I can do that.

( easy as pie. )

But you better make it a good snowman.

[callada]

Mary would have my head if it wasn't good enough anyway. She's the real judge of us all.

[He adores her, but she really does have most of Beacon wrapped around her little finger. Good thing a child can't do too much with that kind of power. Right?]

[necromantiae]

You know, I don't know if I've met her.

( was he missing out? )

How awful of me.

[callada]

Well that's easy to fix, she's always bouncing all over the place. It's a pain to get her to go to sleep sometimes. We share a room.

[And anyway he's not her dad and while he does his best to make sure she's safe, she's old enough to look after herself here. It's mostly safe. He was on his own before her age, a lot of kids are. At least she has the good fortune of being surrounded by people who are there to help.]

[necromantiae]

Is she young?

( he mentions bouncing and he can't help but thing of a child. )

That's...unfortunate if it's true. I would hope I wouldn't see a child here. There's a lot of things I can stomach but that's a lot.

[callada]

Yeah. Not sure exactly how old she is. Ten? Probably not older than that.

[Mentally, anyway. Who knows how old she is physically, given her origins. It hardly matters here now. Nobody grows, nobody ages. She might have stayed forever a child in her home world, she might not have, but here she won't stand out in doing so.]

It's... rough, I know. Nobody should have to die that young. Lotta kids do, though.

[necromantiae]

Yeah, I know. I just try not to think about that because it's...sad.

( he sighs. )

She doing okay?

[callada]

No worse than any of the rest of us. Actually, I get the sense she kind of likes it here. She's always trying to make friends with the forest spirits.

[And it's given her an escape from the life she left behind. Like he's found himself, there's a sort of freedom found in a place where nobody knows you or your family, or the situation in your home world. He knows more about Mary than most, he wagers, and he's glad for her. She has more of a family here than she ever did back there.]